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A retired Harvard Law School professor whose car allegedly struck and killed a woman riding a motor scooter in Newton last summer has been cited with motor vehicle homicide, prosecutors said today.

Detlev Vagts, 81, of Cambridge was cited in the July 8 collision on Ward Street that resulted in the death of Marcia Kearney, 54, of Northampton, the Middlesex district attorney’s office said in a statement.

A court date has not been set.

An investigation by the Newton police and Massachusetts State Police Reconstructionist team showed that Kearney was riding her Vespa west on Ward Street when she applied her left signal to turn onto Grant Avenue. As she was making the left turn, she was struck from behind by Vagts’ car, the DA’s office said.

Investigators allege that Vagts was traveling partly in the opposite lane on Ward Street when the collision occurred. Following the crash, Vagts drove another 448 feet before heading back to the site of the collision, the DA’s office said.

In an interview after the crash, Vagts said that he got lost driving his wife to the dentist in his 2010 Subaru Legacy when the collision occurred.